Huffington Post on IP's Baffle-Former Bolts

Best article on the baffle bolts in the media. It is interesting the NYTs not following this. So the NRC is thinking about shutting down Indian Point 3 and others.

It is a perfect storm with Indian Point. Long term problems with the owner and the plant. The governor stepped in again and again. The relicening board is in progress. The relicencing board stepped in and got the bolt inspection on the advice of the activist.  

Critical Nuclear Reactor Bolts Fail at Indian Point 2

04/01/2016 10:05 am ET | Updated 3 days ago

• Roger WitherspoonJournalist

A special inspection of the Indian Point 2 nuclear reactor found that more than a quarter of the stainless steel bolts needed to channel cooling water through active nuclear fuel rods were broken, distorted or “missing”, a finding that calls into question the effectiveness of the long term management of this and other ageing power plants.

The inspection, which began March 7, concerned the 832 “baffle-former assembly bolts” which hold special metal plates around the 100-tons of uranium fuel within the reactor and channel cooling water to the bottom of the reactor and then up through center of the bundled 12-foot fuel rods to keep them from overheating. Entergy, which owns the twin Indian Point plants, stated in a March 29 report to the three judge panel of the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (http://1.usa.gov/1Y1oqVO ) that 227 of the baffle-former bolts were degraded, broken, or “missing.” That is an extraordinarily high failure rate of 27.2%.

In its public statement, Entergy sought to minimize the problem by stating they inspected some 2000 bolts and 11% of these were degraded. But their legal filing was more specific. It was only the 832 bolts holding the baffles that had the greatest exposure and suffered the most damage. All 227 of the deteriorated bolts were in this category. Entergy spokesmen at Indian Point and at their corporate office declined to discuss the issue.

The fact that entire bolts or parts of them could not be initially located is considered a serious safety threat. That was the cause of the partial meltdown of the Fermi power reactor outside Detroit in August, 1966. In that case, bits of metal blocked the flow of coolant through two bundles of active fuel rods, and they overheated and melted.

Because of that risk Entergy, after discussions with officials at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, is considering whether or not to shut Indian Point 3 and conduct a similar inspection now, rather than wait until a scheduled refueling outage in 2017. That would be a difficult fiscal pill for Entergy to swallow. The twin plants currently provide only 5% of the electricity used in New York City and neighboring Westchester County, primarily through its 560 megawatt contract with ConEd, the regional transmission company. The New York Power Authority, which provides power to the subways, airports, and municipal buildings, dropped Indian Point two years ago because there are cheaper alternatives.

NRC spokesman Neil Sheehan said “Entergy will have to assess the implications for Indian Point Unit 3. There is no ETA at this point.”

For its part, the NRC is weighing whether or not other plants should be required to conduct similar special inspections of their reactor linings and, if so, how soon. It is not clear at this point how many other plants might have the same type of condition. But, said Sheehan, “we always look for possible generic implications and will do so in this case.”

David Lochbaum, nuclear safety specialist with the Union of Concerned Scientists, said “the NRC is struggling with the question ‘Do we shut down Indian Point 3 and see if there is a problem, or do we look further?’ If it were just those two reactors it would be an easier decision.

“But if they shut down Unit 3 based on probable cause, then why not shut down the other plants that may have this issue? This problem has surfaced before at D. C Cook in Michigan and R.E. Ginna in upstate New York. Why assume those are the only ones?”

Critics of Indian Point urged the NRC to force Entergy to inspect both reactors. “Since IP3 is virtually identical in design as IP2,” said Gary Shaw of the Indian Point Safe Energy Coalition, “IP3 should be shut down immediately to examine the integrity of the reactor core liner. Aging management is a predicate of relicensing and the last year of problems and near misses has already shown that the plant should not be relicensed and decommissioning should be initiated as soon as possible.”

Forced by NY Attorney General

The special inspection that discovered the disintegration of the bolts was undertaken by Entergy to put an end to a series of challenges by the Environmental Unit of New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s office dating to November, 2007. The Environmental Unit has filed more than 35 “contentions,” or legal challenges before the three-judge Atomic Safety and Licensing Board, the judicial arm of the NRC. Their decisions can be appealed to the full NRC board, whose commissioners can uphold, modify, or reverse their conclusions.

Three of the New York challenges involve “embrittlement” of key components within the reactor, including the bolts holding the baffles. These serve a critical function in a pressurized system where temperatures approach 900 degrees Fahrenheit and it is difficult to even out the temperature fluctuations within the huge reactor core. Each of the fuel bundles has a temperature gauge at the end called a thermocouple, so the reactor operators can track the temperature o variations within the reactor. The danger of a breakdown of the zirconium cladding around the uranium fuel does not begin until the temperatures hit around 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit, so there is a lot of room for variation before temperatures hit a dangerous level.

At Fermi, operators saw the temperatures climb inside two of the fuel bundles, but assumed they were getting readings from faulty thermocouples since the other bundles were fine. But a metal plate which had fallen to the bottom of the reactor because of degraded bolts was blocking the flow of coolant through the inside of the two fuel bundles, and these heated up past the melting point.

The Environmental Unit asserted that Entergy’s ageing management program was inadequate and did not take into account the embrittlement of metal as a result of years of intense bombardment by high levels of radiation within the reactor.

In fact, the State’s attorneys found six cases - including Fermi, Cook, and plants in France that were younger than Indian Point - where metal pieces had become brittle, broken off, and blocked critical valves, control rods, or cooling water flow within the reactor. Despite those experiences, inspection of the baffle-former bolts is not required by the NRC and was not originally part of Entergy’s long-term maintenance plan, according to their court filings.

“Entergy voluntarily agreed to have this inspection,” said Lochbaum. “Without the State of New York, that would not have happened. When you look at the reasons that the State wanted them to do the inspections, it is not a surprise that when Entergy did the inspection they found the problem that the State was warning about.

“It had happened many, many times before. Since our reactors are older than the French reactors where this problem showed up, it seemed just a matter of time before it happened here.”
Attorney General Schneiderman said in a statement yesterday that “For years, my office has raised serious concerns about the aging of components of the Indian Point nuclear plants, including “baffle-former assembly” bolts...Our concerns have been repeatedly dismissed by Entergy and the NRC.

“After finally conducting inspections that my office had long called for, Entergy revealed that at Indian Point Unit 2, over one-quarter of these bolts were found either missing or degraded to a point they must be replaced. This significant finding - coupled with the spate of other recent problems revealed at Indian Point - underscores real and present safety issues related to continuing to operate this aging nuclear facility in close proximity to more than 17 million people.”

The Bern On Indian Point: Just Say No

You know what would be terrible for nuclear power...if the Bern gets leverage over his anti nuclearism. It another perfect storm. Remember he comes from a state that shutdown Vermont Yankee. Gov Shumlin rode the coattails of shutdowning VY. It happened on his first election to become governor. It was a close election until the VY leak showed up. His stand on shutting down VY propelled him to be governor twice.

We are in historic territory with the majority of the population now not approving nuclear power according to the Gallup polls. It was a large spike down in approval and the Republican disapproval spiked the most.

I honestly don't like his stand on producting electricity. His is against all forms of producing electricity including fracting. Green electricity can never scale out and this form is all old old technology. The only way it works is if you steal food from poor people, subsidized power. And the industry is less transparent than any other.      

Sanders calls for shutting down NY nuke plant

04/04/16 11:58 AM—Updated 04/04/16 02:25 PM

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By Alex Seitz-Wald

Highlighting his opposition to nuclear power ahead of the Empire State’s primary later this month, Bernie Sanders is calling for the shutdown of a nuclear power plant outside New York City that has leaked radioactive material into groundwater supplies.
The Indian Point plant has long been a source of controversy, thanks to numerous leaks and safety concerns. In February, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo called the latest leak at the plant “unacceptable.” But the plant produces about a quarter of the electricity used by New York City and neighboring Westchester County, making it difficult to replace.

RELATED: What does a tight Dem race in WI mean for NY?

“I am very concerned that the Indian Power nuclear power reactor is more than ever before a catastrophe waiting to happen,” Sanders said in a statement Monday. “In my view, we cannot sit idly by and hope that the unthinkable will never happen. We must take action to shut this plant down in a safe and responsible way. It makes no sense to me to continue to operate a decaying nuclear reactor within 25 miles of New York City where nearly 10 million people live.”

view photo essay

The presidential campaign: Bernie Sanders

The self-described democratic socialist is known for pushing change on income inequality, college affordability and criminal justice reform.

“Even in a perfect world where energy companies didn’t make mistakes, nuclear power is and always has been a dangerous idea because there is no good way to store nuclear waste,” Sanders said. “That is why the United States must lead the world in transforming our energy system away from nuclear power and fossil fuels.”
Sanders is the only candidate in either party who wants to end nuclear energy production, which currently accounts for 20% of U.S. electrical generation. But this is the first time Sanders has leaned into the issue in a high-profile way as a potential wedge issue between rival Hillary Clinton and the Democratic base. 
Sanders wants to replace nuclear with clean renewable energy, like wind and solar. But some environmentalists have called his opposition to nuclear power misguided, arguing nuclear is a good alternative to fossil fuel before renewables can take up the slack.
A narrow majority of Americans favor nuclear energy, while 43% oppose it, according to Gallup. That’s down from a peak in 2010, when 62% supported nuclear power, undermined by the 2011 Fukushima disaster in Japan. Wind and solar energy are highly popular in polls.
Hillary Clinton, whose Chappaqua home is just about 15 miles from the plant, was one of the most vocal critics of Indian Point while she served in the Senate. “Just about every week we pick up the local newspaper and find some other problem at Indian Point,” Clinton said in 2007 as the plant faced a relicensing battle.
But Clinton called for improving operations at the plant rather than shutting it down entirely.
Sanders has used local energy issues, generally pipelines, in past contests to galvanize his supporters and draw contrasts with Clinton.
In Iowa and New Hampshire, he campaigned against pipelines that had general local opposition. In Minnesota, he came out against two Enbridge Pipelines, which he said would a similar impact on climate change as the Keystone XL pipeline.

Explore:

Bernie Sanders, Democrats, Election 2016, Elections, Energy, Energy Policy, Hillary Clinton and Nuclear

Junk Plant Hatch Junk SRV valves Just Like Pilgrim

Sounds like unit 1. It could be unit 2, they usually do these testing just before the outage. 

March 7, 2016: Upgrades To Plant Hatch Unit 1 Enhance The Production Of Low-Cost, Carbon-Free Electricity, Protect Against Extreme Events

05000321/366

These are the same 2 stage SRVs in Pilgrim right now. They pulled a Pilgrim with installing a few 3 stage SRVs in a plant, they were unreliable and they removed the 3 stage. They went to the 3 stage because the current 2 stage SRVs were so unreliable.

I just think there are no “new” replacement SRVs in the US market.

April 4, 2016

CONTACT: Roger Hannah 404-997-4417

Joey Ledford 404-997-4416

NRC Launches Special Inspection of Safety Relief Valves at Hatch Nuclear Plant

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission today launched a special

I am a idiot?

inspection of safety relief valves on Unit 1 of the Hatch nuclear plant.

The plant, operated by Southern Nuclear Operating Co., is located near Baxley, Ga., about 20 miles south of Vidalia.

After the unit’s last refueling outage, plant officials sent all 11 of the safety relief valves, which provide protection from excessive steam pressures and had been replaced during the outage with the same type of valve, to a laboratory for testing. During test procedures, three of the valves did not perform as expected. The cause of the three valves failing to close during the tests has not yet been determined.

Even though the valves were in service during the unit’s last operating cycle, none failed during reactor operations and there was no danger to the public.

“These valves provide an important safety function and it is essential that we understand why they failed to perform as expected during these tests,” said Cathy Haney, Region II administrator. “We felt a special inspection was warranted to gather more information about these valves.”

The onsite inspection will be led by the senior resident inspector at Hatch. He will be assisted by the second Hatch resident inspector and two inspectors from NRC headquarters in Rockville, Md., both with valve expertise. A senior risk analyst from Region II in Atlanta will also contribute to the effort. The five-member team will identify the circumstances of the test failures, review Southern Nuclear’s actions following discovery of the failures, review the testing methodologies, assess Hatch’s maintenance practices, evaluate the operating history of the valves and assess the licensee’s conclusions of the operability of the valves in service.

The onsite portion of the inspection will take several days. A report documenting the results of the inspection should be issued within 45 days of the completion of the inspection.

Junk Plant River Bend: Massive Run to Failure

This is so unprofessional! I can't imagine why aux building ventilation isn't safety related.  

Potential Loss of Secondary Containment Safety Function Due to Failure of Auxiliary Building Ventilation System  

On January 5, 2016, at 10:58 p.m. CST, with the plant operating at 100 percent power, the main control room alarm indicating high pressure in the auxiliary building [NF] actuated. Operators confirmed that the building pressure was out of specification. Secondary containment was declared inoperable, and the Division 2 standby gas treatment system [BH] was started. This action restored building pressure to the acceptable range, and secondary containment was declared operable at 12:27 a.m. on January 6. This condition is being reported in accordance wi,th 10 CFR 50.73(a)(2)(iv)(A) as an event that caused the secondary containment to be potentially incapable of performing its safety function.

INVESTIGATION and immediate ACTIONS 

The normal ventilation system was inspected, and it was determined that a combination of degraded components caused the condition:  

• Seals on the exhaust fan (**FAN**) discharge damper (**BDI\1P**) vanes were degraded. This allowed air to flow backwards through the idle exhaust fan, causing the total exhaust outflow to decrease and building pressure to increase: 

• The flow controller for the supply fan modulating dampers (**CDI\1P**) had failed, allowing excessive air flow that caused building pressure to increase.

Junk Plant River Bend: Better Reactor Level Control

So ever time lightening strikes that line or others you can expect another scram???

Really tripping the feed pumps on high level in a scam is not in licensing. Effectively the level swell getting a feed pump trip is distracting the operators from holistic monitoring the plant for other problem.  If the plant had other problems, say a fire…the staff might get overwhelmed.

Good job on only one restart of a feed pump.

Automatic Reactor Scram and Division 2 Primary Containment Isolation Due to Offsite Grid Electrical Transient

Licensee Event Report 50-458 I 2016-002-00River Bend Station - Unit 1
The initial upward swell of reactor water' level caused all three reactor feedwater pumps to trip. Reactor feedwater pump "C" was restarted approximately eight minutes after the scram.

Following the first automatic actuations of the reactor safety-relief valves (SRVs), operators controlled reactor pressure with intermittent manual opening of selected SRV s. After reactor parameters were stabilized, the MSIV s on the "D" main steam line were opened at approximately 4:29 a.m. to re-establish automatic pressure control.

NRC 2.206 Response: Junk Safety Valves At Indian Point

Basically Gov Cuomo notified his citizens on March 29 of this. The outage began March 7. Isn't my complaint perfectly timed. The NRC's responce is dated March 25 and the baffle bolt problem emerged on March 29.  

Indian Point nuclear power plant shutdown after inspectors discover 'missing' bolts from reactor

  

BY Leonard Greene

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS 

Wednesday, March 30, 2016, 11:04 PM

The Indian Point nuclear power plant will stay shut after inspectors discovered that more than 200 stainless steel bolts were “faulty” or “missing” from a reactor, officials said. 

Entergy Corp., which runs the facility north of New York City, said there was no threat to public safety or health.
Operators had already shut down the plant for a planned outage. They said the bolt setback will keep the site offline for several more weeks. 

Gov. Cuomo said the issue was the latest in a series of incidents that raises concerns about the plant’s management, a sentiment echoed by U.S. Rep. Nita Lowery (D-Westchester). 

“If we can’t trust that the bolts that hold the reactors together are secure, how can we trust that the plant is safe and secure?” she said in a statement.
“It’s too dangerous for Entergy to let maintenance fall behind at this nuclear facility that is situated in the middle of the most densely populated area of the country just miles from New York City.”

Runaway Main Steam Safety Valves (MSSV)Tech Spec Lift Settings 

I think the magnitude of the failures at Indian Point sits outside the experiences of any other plant in the USA. There are other manufacturers supplying similar valves  to other plants who never report and tech spec failures.

It will be interesting this outage if more MSSVs are failed according to tech specs. 

He never answered why the failures ramped up in 2009? These is massively defective maintenence and a defective design.

I got to give great credit to the NRC with answering me, more important putting it on the docket for everyone to see.    

 

March 25, 2016

Mr. Michael Mulligan

P.O. Box 161

Hinsdale, NH 03451

Dear Mr. Mulligan:

This letter is in response to your letter dated February 4, 2016, to Mr. Victor M. Mccree, Executive Director for Operations, of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), regarding main steam safety valve (MSSV) failures at both the Indian Point and Shearon Harris nuclear power plant facilities. Your letter addresses multiple licensee event reports (LERs) where surveillance testing identified that the lift settings of MSSVs were found to be outside of the technical specification (TS) allowed tolerance. Your letter asserts that there has been an unexplained increase in the number of MSSVs failures due to setpoint drift since 2009 and that NRC generic communications on this subject are out-of-date and nonresponsive to your perceived industry trends. Specifically, you requested that your concerns be reviewed pursuant to Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations (10 CFR), Section 2.206, "Requests for action under this subpart," and the following actions be taken:

•  Perform an immediate special inspection of MSSV failures at Indian Point; 

•  Issue a new NRC Information Notice on MSSV failures; and 

• Require that Indian Point immediately eradicate any problems associated with MSSVs up to, and including, a plant shutdown.

The NRC staff has reviewed your letter against the criteria of NRC Management Directive 8.11, "Review Process for 10 CFR 2.206 Petitions" (Agencywide Documents Access and Management System (ADAMS) Accession No. ML041770328), and concludes that it does not meet the threshold for review under 10 CFR 2.206 because the issues you raised have already been the subject of staff review and have been resolved. Therefore, the staff rejects your request to review your letter pursuant to 10 CFR 2.206.

Since your letter focused on Indian Point, the following discussion is based upon the Indian

Point plant design, the LERs identified in your letter, and the associated NRC staff review.

Steam Generator Safety Relief Valves 

Each Indian Point unit has 5 safety relief valves installed on piping connected to each of the 4 steam generators. Therefore, there are 20 relief valves to remove steam from the generators during a plant accident or transient event. These valves are installed in a high pressure, high temperature and high vibration (due to steam flow) environment. As a result, testing and adequate maintenance are required to ensure the operability of the valves.

The design of the valves ensures that the steam system, including the secondary side of the steam generators, transient maximum pressure does not exceed 110 percent of the system design pressure during accident or transient events. This is the standard requirement for relief regulations in 10 CFR 50.55a require following the ASME Code. For Indian Point, the system design pressure is 1170.5 pounds per square inch gauge (psig), resulting in a maximum transient pressure of 1287 psig. Additionally, the relief valves are designed, such that, they together have the capacity to relieve 108 percent of design steam flow, which exceeds the design limit of 102 percent steam flow relief capacity assumed in the plant's safety analysis. Indian Point steam generator relief valves are nominally set at 1065, 1080, 1095, 1110 and 1120 psig. Valves are set at different pressures to prevent rapid cycling that could occur if multiple valves opened at the same time. The TSs at Indian Point and the ASME Code require that, when the valves are placed in service, they are set within +/- 1 percent of these values.

After the valves are in service, they are required to be tested per the ASME Code requirement.The "as found" test limit of+/- 3 percent for each valve, is listed in the TSs, and is an ASME Code requirement. Valves that are found to be outside of this limit are required to be declared inoperable and corrective actions taken to restore them to an operable status. The maximum allowed "as found" + 3 percent limit is 1153.6 psig.

Test Results 

A review of the test results discussed in LE Rs 2009-002 (Unit 3), 2010-002 (Unit 2), 2011-004 (Unit 3), 2012-005 (Unit 2) and 2015-002 (Unit 3) for Indian Point found that there was no safety impact as a result of the MSSV failures. In all cases, although the valves failed the acceptance criteria, all of the valves lifted below the system design pressure limit of 1170.5 psig and well below the transient design limit of 1287 psig. Additionally, in all cases adequate steam relief capacity was maintained.

Corrective Actions 

The ASME Code and NRC regulations require that test failures be evaluated and corrective actions taken to address degraded conditions. Entergy Nuclear Operations, Inc., the licensee, has taken multiple short and long term corrective actions to address the failures including:

• • Immediate valve disassembly and inspection, expansion of testing to include valves not initially scheduled for testing, and resetting valve setpoints to within +/- 1 percent tolerances.

•  Changed preventive maintenance valve overhaul schedules were changed from an 8-year to a 6-year periodicity.

•  Changed Unit 3 testing interval so that all valves are tested every 2 years (previously 4 years testing requirement) until modifications are completed. Completed modifications to 7 of the 20 valves.

•  Finally, development and implementation of permanent design modifications including installing bronze wear sleeves to limit spindle wear.

Summary 

The test data was reviewed and the NRC staff concludes there is no safety concern related to the performance of the MSSVs. Based on the test results, the staff determined the valves would have operated such that the design pressure of the main steam system would not have been exceeded.

The NRC staff has reviewed each of these failures and associated corrective actions as part of the reactor oversight baseline inspection program. Each LER was reviewed and in some cases NRC enforcement action was taken. Licensee identified violations are discussed in inspection reports dated May 11, 2010 (ADAMS Accession No. ML 101310350), August 23, 2010 (ADAMS Accession No. ML 102240597), and August 9, 2011 (ADAMS Accession No. ML 112212055). Severity Level IV violations are discussed in inspection reports dated August 9, 2012 (ADAMS Accession No. ML 12222A131) and August 7, 2015 (ADAMS Accession No. ML 15222A186). Finally, a non-cited violation is discussed in the inspection dated August 7, 2015 cited above. Corrective actions performed or scheduled by the licensee were found to be acceptable.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact Douglas Pickett at (301) 415-1364 or by e-mail at Douglas.Pickett@nrc.gov.

Junk Plant Indian Point: IAEA Says Maintenance Philosophy is "Run To Failure"?

Updated 4/2

Many plants have reconfigured their core into a upflow design. Why didn't Indian do this???

"To date, baffle bolt cracking was observed only in the “down-flow” design."

***So everyone knew baffle-reformer bolts degradation was a direct threat to safety in the 1980s. They knew the mechanism was related to radiation exposure in 1980s. While Indian Point waited until a 2016 outage to preform their first inspection? Is this being safety conservative. They knew it was a difficult and expensive job, a high potential for extending a outage, so their priority system kept putting off replacing the bolts. 

It goes to the question how these plants will enter into end-of-life? Will a plant end its life as a grand old lady who served society's greater purpose or will they shutdown under a national scandal? Will the permanent shutdown scandals proliferate further depressing the USA's public Nuclear Power approval rate? With a low public approval rate, can you imagine the hay the politicians and their competitors can make with this as a election issue. 

Remember Indian Point is a special case. The giant state governor is out to shutdown the plant. They have been negatively in the news with problems for years. This makes the plant highly susceptible to magnifying and amplifying events at the plant. Will controversy ruin the rest of Entergy's nuclear fleet in the eyes of the NRC and Wall Street.

 

What will a cascade accident look like. When large percentages of our population through the media panic uncontrollable. When nobody can control outcome like TMI. Here comes massive re-regulations? 

 

This is going to have very expensive implications at other plants.     

IAEA: Assessment and Management of Ageing of Major Nuclear Power Plant Components Important to Safety: PWR Vessel Internals 

2007 Update

7.5. CRACKING OF THE BAFFLE BOLTS

7.5.1. General 

In 1980’s inspections indicated baffle bolts cracking. The bolts are made of 316 cold worked stainless steels. They failed by intergranular cracking. Normally, 316 steel is not prone to IGSCC in this water environment and all the bolts cracked were located in the second and third rows from the bottom, that is exactly the place corresponding to the highest neutron 48 irradiation. This demonstrates that the neutron irradiation is a significant feature for this cracking, even if the exact mechanism is unknown now. It is difficult to conclude whether the bolts cracked by IASCC, or due to irradiation embrittlement, or by other IGSCC phenomena. To date, baffle bolt cracking was observed only in the “down-flow” design.

This cracking is a concern and made necessary the development of ultrasonic methods for the non destructive examination of the bolts. Table 13 shows Baffle-Former Bolts inspection results in some IAEA Member States.

…Creep is a function of stress level, temperature and time at temperature. Fast neutron exposure enhances austenitic stainless steels to creep. Some creep/relaxation of baffle bolts has been observed during testing and replacement of baffle bolts in the USA, France, Japan, and Belgium.

…IAEA-TECDOC-1119 documented ageing assessment and management practices for PWR reactor vessel internals (RVIs) that were current at the time of its finalization in 1998. It concluded that while irradiation assisted stress corrosion cracking (IASCC) of PWR internals ad not been observed for structural components globally so far, it may be of concern with time. After the issuance of the TECDOC, an inspection of baffle bolts in the United States discovered cracking in two of the four plants inspected. As the baffle and former assembly provides an interface between the core and the core barrel region and is important to safety because it provides a high concentration of the reactor coolant flow in the core region, IASCC on the baffle-former bolts is of safety concern. In addition, swelling (void formation), which was not addressed in IAEA-TECDOC-1119, could become an issue in PWR internals because of low displacement rates and increased temperature due to gamma heating. Concern of fretting wear of control rod guide tubes has also been raised in Japan. These events led to new ageing management actions by both NPP operators and regulators. Therefore it was recognized that IAEA-TECDOC-1119 should be updated by incorporating those new events and their countermeasures.

Indian Point Junk; 1998 Pernicious Engineering Certainty/ Uncertainty Fraud

I'll make the case the scale of the degraded, failed, and missing bolts is unprecedented in the history of the nuclear industry. Why were their evaluations so far off? How can you trust any of their self serving safety evaluations?

So now they will have to check all the bolts or replace them. 

This document says the industry seen degradation of the bolts in a French reactor in 1988. 

Remember the baffle plates last year in North Anna, the space between the plates has been increasing over the years from some unknown phenomena. Flow through these plates has increased and caused fuel damaged from flow vibrations. They had some interactions with mixed fuel plants.   

Information Notice No. 98-11: Cracking of Reactor Vessel Internal Baffle Former Bolts in Foreign Plants 

UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION OFFICE OF NUCLEAR REACTOR REGULATION WASHINGTON, D.C. 20555-0001

March 25, 1998

NRC INFORMATION NOTICE 98-11:	CRACKING OF REACTOR VESSEL INTERNAL BAFFLE FORMER BOLTS IN FOREIGN PLANTS

Addressees 

All holders of operating licenses for pressurized-water reactors (PWRs) except those who have permanently ceased operation and have certified that fuel has been permanently removed from the reactor vessel. 

Purpose 

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is issuing this information notice to alert addressees to the cracking of reactor vessel internal baffle former bolts (see Figures 1 and 2) found at several foreign PWRs and to inform addressees of actions taken and planned by domestic PWR owners groups in response to this experience. It is expected that the recipients will review the information for applicability to their facilities and consider actions, as appropriate, to avoid similar problems. However, suggestions contained in this information notice are not NRC requirements; IN 98-11 

Description of Circumstances 

Reactor vessel internals are structures located within the reactor vessel that support and orient the reactor fuel assemblies and direct coolant flow through the core. The core baffle is part of the internals structure, which consists of vertical plates that surround the outer faces of the peripheral fuel assemblies. The baffle directs coolant flow through the core. The vertical plates are bolted to the edges of horizontal former plates that are bolted to the inside surface of the core barrel. There are typically eight levels of former plates located at various elevations within the core barrel. The bolts that secure the baffle plates to the former plates are referred to as "baffle former bolts." 

European plants identified the cracking of baffle former bolts as early as 1988 and this problem continues to occur. Although this cracking is not fully understood, testing of cracked bolts suggests an age-related intergranular stress-corrosion cracking process influenced by bolt material, fluence, stress, and temperature. The reported cracking occurred in 316 cold-worked stainless steel bolts. Most of the cracking reported has been in four French 900-MWe (megawatt electric) PWRs. 

An investigation of the cracking was discussed in a paper contained in the Proceedings of the International Symposium Fontevraud III, dated September 12-16, 1994, held at the Royal Abbey of Fontevraud, France. The symposium paper reports that the cracking of baffle former bolts seems to be limited to the first six PWRs operated by Electricité de France (EDF), which are all of the same design and are identified as the "CPO" series. Further, the paper reports that bolt cracking has not been seen in the other French 900-MWe plants (the "CPY" series), or in the 1300-MWe plants. The paper notes that there are differences between the two series with regard to bolt design, bolt material, operating conditions, and reactor coolant flow paths. Some plants in both groups have been in operation for approximately the same number of hours. The plants which reported the greatest number of cracked bolts are Fessenheim Unit 2 and Bugey Unit 2, both of which are CPO series plants. The number of cracked bolts identified at these plants are 29 and 54, respectively. All of the baffle former bolts (960) in each plant were tested ultrasonically. 

Discussion 

At the foreign plants, ultrasonic testing was performed to assess the integrity of the baffle former bolts. Five bolts were removed from the Bugey Unit 2 baffle assembly for a detailed investigation of the degradation process. One of the bolts was found to be broken, three were found to be cracked, and one was found to be sound. The conclusions reached in the symposium paper are that (1) baffle bolt cracking has been limited to plants of the same design (CPO series), (2) bolt cracking has occurred predominantly in zones of fluence and maximum temperature, (3) in the zones of maximum fluence, bolt cracking is found predominantly in the bolts under the highest mechanical stress, and (4) bolt cracking has occurred in some plants although not in other plants of the same design, a phenomenon that may be a consequence of varying bolt metallurgical properties and plant operating conditions. 

The NRC is not aware of cracking of baffle former bolts in domestic PWRs. Domestic reactor baffle former bolts are subject to the visual inservice inspection requirements of

***So the NRC in 1998 says normal refueling inspection(remote viewing) will catch bolt missing and degradation bolts...why was the NRC so wrong??? This is no doubt pernicious engineer fraud: certainty/uncertainty gaming is going on. Basically a profit centered honor system. The system turns massive engineering uncertainty into absolute public certainty. This is a natural product of a non transparent system and a industry having too much political power.    

Check out how terrible is the private self serving code authority of the ASME, this is a 1998 NRC document...they finally do the first inspection in 2016 and finding massive damage.

I'll bet you in past outages Entergy seen the bolts in other areas of the coolant, bottom of the core...knew what they were and choose to operate without understanding what is going on. 

As far as the noise parts monitor...I am sure they knew they had loose parts in the core. Usually the loose parts monitor has a lot of false positive. Imagine shutting down a plant and rip the core apart, and finding out it was just a bad loose parts detectors. So these guys set the alarm so high they can't hear nothing. 

This is a Fukushima style event. Nobody could image a 9.0 earthquake could occur and the meltdowns would destroy a nation's fleet of nuclear plants. The industry could only imagine a few bolts degraded or loose in the plant speaking to the industry representatives, while in Indian Point have many hundreds are degraded or missing bolts. 

What happens if a large section of the baffle plates create a huge opening in the plates while at power. I see massive fuel damage. Basically the opening in the baffle plates creates dp across the core, reducing cooling from the steam generator. It would instantly destroy the nuclear facility. Do irreparable damage to the world wide industry. You wouldn't get any off site dose, but it would be a bigger than TMI public relations and political disaster. This would quickly shut down a lot of plants. I imagine all the cooling systems would bypass some of their cooling flow through the baffle hole.      

Section XI of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers Boiler and Pressure Vessel Code. However, the baffle bolt cracking reported in foreign PWRs has occurred at the juncture of the bolt head and the shank, which is not accessible for visual inspection. 

Domestic PWR owners groups have met with the NRC staff to report on their current and planned activities regarding the potential for baffle bolt cracking in domestic PWRs. The details of those meetings are discussed below. 

The Westinghouse Owners Group (WOG) provided an assessment of the cracking of the baffle former bolts identified in foreign PWRs, including the potential impact of cracking on domestic Westinghouse plants, and provided information on its current and planned activities. The WOG stated that because of the large number of baffle former bolts in the baffle assembly, the failure of a few bolts should not have a significant safety impact. The WOG activities include (1) development of analytical methods and acceptance criteria for bolt analysis, (2) performance of risk-informed evaluations, (3) performance of analysis for three plant groupings (2-loop, 3-loop, and 4-loop) of what constitutes acceptable bolting, (4) continued participation in domestic and foreign related activities, (5) preparation of bid specifications for bolt inspection equipment, and (6) preparations for bolt inspection and replacement. The WOG identified lead plant candidates for the 2-loop and 3-loop groups and a proposed inspection schedule for each group. The WOG indicated that the bolt material used in the 2-loop group is 347 stainless steel and the bolt material used in the 3-loop group is 316 cold-worked stainless steel.
The Babcock and Wilcox (B&W) Owners Group (B&WOG) provided information on its current and planned activities to address the potential for cracking of baffle former bolts in domestic B&W plants, including a presentation of its "Plant Licensing Reactor Vessel Internals Aging Management Program." The B&WOG provided a preliminary determination that bolt cracking is not considered a significant safety issue for B&W plants. This determination is based upon knowledge of the baffle and bolting designs involved and is supported by conservative analyses that assume both normal-operating and maximum accident-loading conditions. The B&WOG activities include (1) collection and evaluation of available inspection and material data, (2) development and qualification of replacement bolt materials, and (3) preparation of a possible baffle bolt inspection on a lead plant during the next 10-year inservice inspection interval. The B&WOG indicated that the bolt material used in B&W plants is 304 stainless steel. 

The Combustion Engineering (CE) Owners Group (CEOG) provided an assessment of the cracking of the baffle former bolts reported in foreign PWRs, including the potential impact of the cracking on domestic CE plants. The CEOG believes that the most likely mechanism for the cracking of cold-worked 316 stainless steel baffle former bolts in foreign plants is irradiation- assisted stress-corrosion cracking (IASCC). The CEOG indicated that only two of its plants use bolts to attach the core shroud panels (i.e., the baffle plates) to the former plates. The CEOG believes that these two plants are less susceptible to IASCC because of several design differences: (1) the material used in these bolts is annealed 316 stainless steel, which is not cold worked; (2) the bolt stress from preload, as a percentage of yield strength, is much less than the EDF plants; (3) the differential pressure across the core shroud panels does not result in tensile loads on the panel (i.e., the baffle) bolts during normal operation; and (4) the core shroud panel design allows for some flexing of the former plate relative to the core barrel, thus effectively reducing the load on the panel bolts. 

This information notice requires no specific action or written response. If you have any questions about the information in this notice, please contact one of the technical contacts listed below or the appropriate Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation (NRR) project manager.

	Original /s/'d by D.B. Matthews
	FOR:
	Jack W. Roe, Acting Director Division of Reactor Program Management Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation

 

Junk Plant Indian Point Baffle Former: They Will Never Restart the Plant

I blame this on governor Cuomo. He jumps up and down like a madman railing about the recent problems at Indian Point and nothing ever changers. He doesn't effectively use his political powers. 

***Their aging management  system through campaign contribution is severely flawed. 

 

Most people in the USA in a new Gallup poll disapprove of Nuclear power...does this even make them more vulnerable? 

There is a well know corrosion problem with these bolts, many plants had to fish bolts out of the coolant system.

***They are supposed to replace the bolts...it will be worst if the new bolts failed.
 

***Why didn't the loose parts monitor inside the core pick up all the circulating broken bolts???

Look up these terms,

Baffle former

Baffle Jetting  

Most plants have changed the flow around the baffle plates. What is it a upflow conversion.

Bottom line, Entergy-Indian point is going to be implicated in not doing the industry and Westinghouse required inspections associated with the baffle plates and their bolting.

Has there been fuel damage?

Steam generator damage?

Pipe damage or other associated with bolts loose in the coolant.

Acceptable Baffle-former Bolt Pattern Analysis for Reactor Internals Evaluation

Lower Internals Upflow Conversion

Their licence renewal documents...it shows a vulnerability. 


Page 17 and 18? 

http://pbadupws.nrc.gov/docs/ML0719/ML071910220.pdf

You get the idea...page

ADDITIONAL ACTIVITIES AND PROGRAM ATrRIBUTES FOP
AGING MANAGEMENT OF C ORE BARREL'FORMER BOL'rS (AMP-4.7)
Attribute OJescriptlon
Scope Efects of ,racking caused by fatigue, irradiation-in luced cianges in
material properties, and irradiation-induced changes in stresses
Surveillance a Visual inspection per Examineition Calegory B.N-3 of ASME Sqction Xl,
Techniques Subsection IWB and Draft Subsection IWG
. LoosE parts detection monitoring system
& Augmented inspections
Frequency a Monitor with loose paits detection system
0 ASME Section Xl requirements, IWB-2410, -24111, -2412, -2420, -2430
and Draft IWG-2410, .2420, and -243)
• Perform sample baseline inspections prior to l.R term with enhanced
frequency in accordance with corrective actions
Acceptance Criteria # No loose parts from barre/fonrner bolt assemlt,ly and
9 Fatigue management program in Figure 4-1 and
6 Number of acceptable bolts and location a the minimum number and
location requilvd to maintain core coolability and DNBR within CLB
limits, or, if needed, for JCO, number of acceptable bolts and location a
than JCO assumptions.
Correctie Actions The following courses of action depend on the boll conditkin detennined biy
the monitoring and inspection progirams:
. Supplemental examinations, analytical justifications or
repair/replacement when relevant conditions are detected
* Visual inspecJons, augmented inspections (e.g., ultrasonic inspectiont),
analytical justificationi or repadr/replac:ement when barTel/formar bolt
assembly Iooise parts are detced
* Adjustment of frequency of inspections and coverage
A"n alysis (e.g., fractunm mechanics techniques, risk-based technology,
advanced thermal/hydraulic methodo0gies)
SB olt rsplaceffent of a sample set so the existing bolts with incications
may be analyzed (materials testing) and the row bolti; monitored
* Follow action; prescrbed in fatigue rrmagerrent program
Conf:Tation Aiceptabils performance per
* Loose parts rnonitorirg program
0 Augmented examinatons (e.g., ultrasonic examinations)
• Analylical jusificatlon
CORIGM DIOE6 BRAO~r

9APRATO PORKBMO T

Columbia's First Scram in Six years?

It sure sounds like Columbia was putting production over safety. 

Cooling problem shuts down nuclear plant near Richland

RICHLAND, Wash. — A power company shut down a nuclear plant in south-central Washington state after operators received an indication that a system used to cool equipment wasn't working.

Energy Northwest spokesman John Dobken said early Tuesday that no radiation was released from Columbia Generating Station near Richland, and no danger to the public was created.

He told The Associated Press that officials hope to restart the plant sometime this week.

The Tri-City Herald reported that the plant was shut down Monday after operators were alerted to problems with the system that uses water to provide cooling to heat exchangers and pumps, including those that control the power level of the reactor.

Energy Northwest said it appeared a water system valve may

This doesn't make since with the valve being out of position. Why didn't the valve being out of position scram the plant last week? Is it employee sabotage? Is it management trying to put a shadow over the whistleblowers by tripping the plant?  

not have been in the right position. An investigation has begun.

The last time the plant had an unplanned shutdown was in November 2009, when hydraulic fluid leaked.

VY "Securitas"

This is a Swedish company. Doesn't Entergy love America? Why can't Entergy hire an American company?

They are having Union problem with their mid level managers indicating they are the low cost security service provider?

Everyone Worried About Belgium Nuclear Plants

Update 3/27

So far only people needed to run the plant are allowed on site. They don't trust the background checks on the 800 employees who support the plant. They have hired hard core terrorist who have worked in the plant. Can you even imagine that happening in the USA?

Remember outside Belgium, there has been intense pressure to shutdown these troublesome plants. There are too old and obsolete to be in operation. I cannot imagine any of these plant making money or paying for themselves in the last two years with all the safety shutdowns.

I can see one of these guys getting into a serious accident because their troops at the site are being distracted from paying attention to problems at the plant and the support people not doing their jobs. 

So now Europeans now got a lot of fear in them and they are all going to be pissed at the ineffectiveness of their governments. They got as big a problem with institutions and weak government failures as us. So what comes out now eventually, is the people are going to be angry with their government? How will government respond to great public anger? Will they scrap-goat the nukes because their institutions are ineffective?            

Drudge: Belgium fears Nuclear plant TargetGuard Murdered; Security Pass stolen

I don't think the terrorist got a chance of getting through the secuity of a Belgium nuclear plant. They don't got the capabilities for that. All bets are off if they got heavy weapons.  

Belgium Fears Nuclear Plants Are Vulnerable 

By ALISSA J. RUBIN and MILAN SCHREUERMARCH 25, 2016
BRUSSELS — As a dragnet aimed at Islamic State operatives spiraled across Brussels and into at least five European countries on Friday, the authorities were also focusing on a narrower but increasingly alarming threat: the vulnerability of Belgium’s nuclear installations. 

The investigation into this week’s deadly attacks in Brussels has prompted worries that the Islamic State is seeking to attack, infiltrate or sabotage nuclear installations or obtain nuclear or radioactive material. This is especially worrying in a country with a history of security lapses at its nuclear facilities, a weak intelligence apparatus and a deeply rooted terrorist network. 

On Friday, the authorities stripped security badges from several workers at one of two plants where all nonessential employees had been sent home hours after the attacks at the Brussels airport and one of the city’s busiest subway stations three days earlier. Video footage of a top official at another Belgian nuclear facility was discovered last year in the apartment of a suspected militant linked to the extremists who unleashed the horror in Paris in November…

Belgium steps up security at nuclear sites in wake of attacks 

Military presence increased at Tihange and Doel plants as officials continue previous investigation of a secret video shot by man linked to Paris attacks Belgian authorities have stepped up security at nuclear sites but safety officials said there was no concrete element to suggest a specific threat against the country’s reactors or plants. 

Secret video footage of a senior Belgian nuclear official was found in November at the home of a Belgian man, Mohamed Bakkali, suspected to be part of the logistics network for November’s Paris attacks that killed 130 people.
The 10-hour video, shot by a hidden camera in a bush, showed a senior nuclear official coming and going out of his home in the Flanders region. 

Belgian investigators have not said whether the video suggested any specific threat to an individual or to a nuclear site. The inquiry is ongoing. 

Bakkali has been in prison since his arrest in November and investigators are looking at whether he had links to the Bakraoui brothers who blew themselves up in this week’s suicide-bomb attacks on a Brussels airport and metro station which killed 31 people...